How Voter Education is Important to Hunting Policies

There are numerous states that allow hunting policies to be voted on as a referendum on state-wide ballots, but who is doing the voting?

Do they know the importance of hunting? Do they understand the science behind recommended policies? Voter education is important and sadly under-utilized.

Recently, sportsmen in Michigan began discussing the need for voter education for referendum-based policy decisions. According to a news story by WLUC in Escanaba, Michigan, the Western Upper Penninsula Citizen’s Advisory Council met with representatives from the Michigan Department of Natural Resources to discuss this issue.

The ultimate concerns rest in urban voters that might not have a full understanding of the impact that hunters and hunting have on the ecosystem and on conservation as a whole.

Voter education through state agencies across the board is of utmost importance. The anti-hunting block in America spends hundreds of thousands of dollars each year on relaying information to the public and to voters in particular.

It is rare that pro-hunting groups band together and present the same type of concerted front on behalf of the policies and laws that are presented. However, experience has shown that when they do, the voting block will listen and tends to be pro.

Don’t forget, education of the public begins with sportsmen on a daily basis.